Learn and Do

Youth Education

New River Land Trust plays an important role in connecting local youth with the beautiful land around them. Our educational outreach focuses on four important areas: Conservation Connections in Cultural Heritage, Local Food and Farm to Table Initiatives, Water Quality and Habitat Diversity, and Nature Play and Environmental Appreciation. Our youth education outreach is designed to inspire students to value their natural surroundings and to foster responsibility and stewardship of farmland, forests, and watersheds.

Our education projects provide area youth with opportunities like:

Learning and documenting histories of conserved land through music and art

Adult Education

Bud Jeffries and his son painstakingly rebuilt the original home of Mary and William Ingles

The New River Land Trust partners with the Lifelong Learning Institute to offer field trips and seminars related to the outdoors and conservation topics.

LLI members have visited the Ingles Ferry Farm and Tavern, the historic McDonalds Mill in Catawba Valley, went to a farm where habitat is being restored for the Northern Bobwhite, and visited the Hahn Easement to explore the research and restoration projects going on there.

In Spring of 2019, we’ll visit the Bixler easement, where Glade Road Growing is located, and get a tour of the farm. Upcoming Adult Education trips and activities can be found in our events calendar.

Landowners

The New River Land Trust (NRLT) provides outreach, education, facilitation and implementation services to landowners with an interest in conserving rural land and its associated natural and/or cultural resources. We have a particular focus on the New River region, although over the years we have worked with people out of state and in many Virginia counties.

Historically the NRLT’s primary conservation tool has been donated conservation easements and providing information about how these easements work. However, every piece of land and every landowner’s needs are unique. The NRLT works hard to find conservation options that fit each situation. Options include the following:

Tom Douthat on his conserved farm in Pulaski County.

Conservation easements, both donations and easement purchase projects

Donations of land for conservation

Fee simple purchase of land for conservation purposes

Federal, state and local government conservation incentives with a few examples below